Saturday, October 16, 2004

Forgot

This was meant to be part of the last bilge but somehow it got censored by my delete key. Fancy that. My mind is like a sieve so what follows will not be a verbatim replication.

I noted that there was a local government election back in sunny Oz last weekend, which, unfortunately I couldn't attend. Get me out of here - I want to vote! I couldn't find the necessary authoritaa to sign my postal vote so I didn't. Sorry.

After reading some reports on the SMH, it appears that the existing government (Shooting Party) got back in with an increased majority. Oh well. The alternative (Silly Party) was not up to it, once again. Oh well. I would have voted for the Raving Loony Party anyway. They didn't get much of a look in either.

Please explain?

Training

The worthy burgers of the Schelde aren't too interested in going hard any more, as it's October and the cyclo-tourist season has finished. I don't blame them either! I had my "off season" in September but am now trying to bash myself into shape for the crits in Oz.

So today I set off after Patrick "De Witte" and a couple of others at exactly the same point as last week - at the very top of the hill, halfway between Gavere and Zwalm. The bunch did give chase and it was less than 10 seconds behind me when I finally caught Patrick. I sat up for a bit but Patrick had a better idea and did another turn, so I followed suit and we opened up a gap. That was the last the bunch saw of us until we turned around for the second lap at Zwijnaarde.

Patrick wisely stopped working at the foot of the Molenberg, leaving me to do a 40km TT with him tucked in safely, shouting words of encouragement occasionally :-) We picked up a few more along the Schelde - Jules, Karl and eventually Lucien. That was a long turn! But it was good training, as I could keep it about 5-10 beats below threshold on the way back. All up it was 55 km (first bridge -> Zwijnaarde) in 1:28:00, which is nowhere near the best time (about 1:22:00) but it will satisfy me. We weren't going hard at the beginning.

Tomorrow should be easier, if indeed there's a bunch. Last Sunday I had to do the whole ride solo, so I went a different way. I have yet to do the Paterberg and Koppenberg on the Flandria, but I will. It's really fast on all the other hills that I've taken it over. Oohlala.

Then Lombardy. Nice race! The Kid (Cunego) won, and is looking like the next big star. Basso was a little frustrated, and probably did too much work. He didn't have quite enough for a killer solo attack on the last climb. Boogerd rode well, given that he was sick for most of the week. Evans and Nardello...well what can you say? Two T-Mobiles in the break of five and they finish fourth and fifth. Admittedly, there weren't many kilometres to play with.

Bettini took the World Cup after psyching out Rebellin in the finale. Rebellin couldn't shake Bettini off his wheel so he cracked. Nice going Il Grillo!



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